System and method for handling load and/or store operations in a superscalar microprocessor

ABSTRACT

The present invention provides a system and method for managing load and store operations necessary for reading from and writing to memory or I/O in a superscalar RISC architecture environment. To perform this task, a load store unit is provided whose main purpose is to make load requests out of order whenever possible to get the load data back for use by an instruction execution unit as quickly as possible. A load operation can only be performed out of order if there are no address collisions and no write pendings. An address collision occurs when a read is requested at a memory location where an older instruction will be writing. Write pending refers to the case where an older instruction requests a store operation, but the store address has not yet been calculated. The data cache unit returns 8 bytes of unaligned data. The load/store unit aligns this data properly before it is returned to the instruction execution unit. Thus, the three main tasks of the load store unit are: (1) handling out of order cache requests; (2) detecting address collisions; and (3) alignment of data.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No.09/336,589, filed Jun. 21, 1999, now allowed, which is a continuation ofU.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/962,705, filed Nov. 3, 1997, nowU.S. Pat. No. 5,987,593, which is a file wrapper continuation of U.S.patent application Ser. No. 08/789,620, filed Jan. 27, 1997, which is acontinuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/307,042, filed Sep.16, 1994, now U.S. Pat. No. 5,659,782, which is a continuation of U.S.patent application Ser. No. 07/954,084, filed Sep. 29, 1992, nowabandoned.

The present application is related to the following applications,assigned to the Assignee of the present application: U.S. patentapplication Ser. No. 07/727,058, filed on Jul. 8, 1991, now abandoned,(attorney docket number SP021) by Nguyen et al. and entitled “EXTENSIBLERISC MICROPROCESSOR ARCHITECTURE”, and to a continuation of the '058application Ser. No. 07/817,809, filed on Jan. 8, 1992, now abandoned,which are herein incorporated by reference in their entirety.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The present invention relates generally to the design of a superscalarmicroprocessor and, more particularly, to a system and method forhandling load and store operations in a microprocessor that executesinstructions out-of-order.

2. Discussion of Related Art

A major consideration in a superscalar Reduced Instruction Set Computer(RISC) processor is how to execute multiple instructions in parallel andout-of-order, without incurring data errors due to dependencies inherentin such execution. The simplest instruction issue policy for RISCprocessors, is to issue instructions in exact program order (in-orderissue) and to write the results in the same order (in-order completion).Out-of-order completion is more complex than in-order completion, andimproves performance of superscalar processors for the same types ofoperations. For instance, out-of-order completion is used to improveperformance of long-latency operations such as loads or floating pointoperations. Any number of instructions are allowed to be in execution inthe functional units, up to the total number of pipeline stages in allfunctional units. Instructions may complete out of order, becauseinstruction issuing is not stalled when a functional unit takes morethan one cycle to compute a result. Consequently, a functional unit maycomplete an instruction after subsequent instructions already havecompleted.

Consider the following code sequence where “op” is an operation, “Rn”represents a numbered register, and “:=” represents assignment:

-   R3:=R3 op R5 (1)-   R4:=R3+1 (2)-   R3:=R5+1 (3)-   R7:=R3 op R4 (4)    Here, the assignment of the first instruction cannot be completed    after the assignment of the third instruction, even though    instructions may in general complete out of order. Completing the    first and third instructions out of order would leave an odd,    incorrect value in register R3, possibly causing, for example, the    fourth instruction to receive an incorrect operand value. The result    of the third instruction has an “output dependency” on the first    instruction and the third instruction must complete after the first    instruction to produce the correct output values of this code    sequence. Thus, issuing of the third instruction must be stalled if    its result might later be overwritten by an older instruction which    takes longer to compute.

Out-of-order completion yields higher performance, but requires morehardware, namely data dependency logic. Data dependency logic is morecomplex with out-of-order completion, because this logic checks datadependencies between decoded instructions and all instructions in allpipeline stages. Hardware must also ensure that the results are writtenin the correct order. In contrast, with in-order completion thedependency logic checks data dependencies between decoded instructionsand the few instructions in execution, and results are naturally writtenin the correct order. Out-of-order completion also creates a need forfunctional units to arbitrate for result busses and register-file writeports, because there probably are not enough of these to satisfy allinstructions that can complete simultaneously.

Moreover, out-of-order completion makes it more difficult to deal withinstruction exceptions. An instruction creates an exception when under agiven condition, the instruction cannot be properly executed by hardwarealone.

In-order issue processors stop decoding instructions whenever a decodedinstruction creates a resource conflict or has a true dependency or anoutput dependency on an uncompleted instruction. The processor is thusnot able to look ahead beyond the instructions with the conflict ordependency, even though one or more subsequent instructions might beexecutable. A conventional solution is to isolate the decoder from theexecution stage, so that it continues to decode instructions regardlessof whether they could be executed immediately. This isolation isaccomplished by providing a buffer (called an “instruction window”)between the decode and instruction stages.

For look-ahead, the processor decodes instructions and places them intothe instruction window as long as there is room in the window, and, atthe same time, examines instructions in the window to find instructionsthat may be executed (i.e., instructions that do not have resourceconflicts or dependencies). The instruction window provides a pool ofinstructions, thus giving the processor a look-ahead ability that islimited by the size of the window and the capability of the processor'sInstruction Fetch Unit (IFU). This permits issuing of instructions outof order because instructions may be issued from the window with littleregard for their original program order. The only constraints on theinstruction issuer are those required to ensure that the program behavescorrectly.

The issue constraints on any particular instruction are mostly the sameas with in-order issue: an instruction is issued when it is free ofresource conflicts and dependencies. Out-of-order issue gives theprocessor a larger set of instructions available for issue, improvingits chances of finding instructions to execute concurrently. However,the capability to issue instructions out of order introduces anadditional issue constraint, much as the capability to completeinstructions out of order introduced the constraint of outputdependencies.

To understand this, again consider the above example code sequence. Theassignment of the third instruction cannot be completed until the secondinstruction begins execution. Otherwise, the third instruction mightincorrectly overwrite the first operand of the second instruction. Theresult of the third instruction is said to have an “anti-dependency” onthe first input operand of the second instruction. The termanti-dependency refers to the fact that the constraint is similar tothat of true dependencies, except reversed. Instead of the firstinstruction producing a value that the second uses, the secondinstruction produces a value that destroys a value that the first oneuses. To prevent this, the processor must not issue the thirdinstruction until after the second one begins. Because the secondinstruction depends on the first, the third instruction also must waitfor the first to complete, even though the third instruction isotherwise independent. Anti-dependencies are mainly of concern wheninstructions can issue out of order. An input operand of a stalledinstruction can be destroyed by a subsequent instruction during normaloperation. However, in scalar processors, instruction exceptions aresometimes handled by correcting the exceptional condition, then retryingthe problematic instruction. If this instruction completed out of order,it is possible that, when it is retried, its input operands have beenoverwritten by subsequent instructions. This problem cannot occur in aprocessor that supports precise interrupts. The solution may requirethat the processor maintain copies of instruction operands to allowrestart.

Two typical operations performed by program instructions are load andstore operations. Generally, load and store operations read and modifymemory locations, respectively. As with other program instructions,loads and stores can be executed out of order. Even though loads andstores can be decoded at the same time, only one load or store isconventionally issued per cycle. A load is typically given priority overa store to use the data-cache, because the load is likely to produce avalue that the processor needs to proceed with computation. If a storeconflicts with a load for the data-cache, the store is typically held ina store buffer until the store can be performed. Furthermore, a store isconventionally performed in program-sequential order with respect toother stores, and is performed only after all previous instructions,including loads, have completed. This preserves the processor's in-orderstate in the data-cache, because cache updates are not performed untilit is absolutely correct to do so. The store buffer aids in keepingstores in the correct order and in deferring the completion of a storeuntil previous instructions have completed.

Because stores are held until the completion of all previousinstructions, and because loads produce values needed for computation inthe processor, keeping loads in program order with respect to stores hassignificant negative impact on performance. If a load waits until allpreceding stores complete, and therefore waits until all instructionpreceding the most recent store complete, then all instructionsfollowing the load that depend on the load data also wait. To avoid thisperformance problem, a load is allowed to bypass preceding stores thatare waiting in the store buffer, and the load data is allowed to be usedin subsequent computation.

When a load can bypass previous stores, the load may need to obtain datafrom a previous store that has not yet been performed. The processorchecks for a true dependency that a load may have on a previous store bycomparing a virtual memory address of the load against a virtual memoryaddresses of all previous, uncompleted stores (virtual addresses areaddresses computed directly by instructions, before address translationby a memory-management unit has been applied). For this discussion, itis assumed that there is a unique mapping for each virtual address, sothat it is not possible for two different virtual addresses to accessthe same physical location. With this assumption, virtual-addresscomparisons detect all dependencies between physical memory locations. Aload has a true dependency on a store if the load address matches theaddress of a previous store, or if the address of any previous store isnot yet computed (in this case, the dependency cannot be detected, sothe dependency is usually assumed to exist). If a load is dependent on astore, the load cannot be satisfied by the data-cache, because thedata-cache does not have the correct value. If the valid address of astore matches the address of a subsequent load, the load is satisfieddirectly from the store buffer—once the store data is valid—rather thanwaiting for the store to complete.

As the foregoing discussion implies, loads and stores are performed in amanner that avoids anti- and output dependencies on memory locations.Loads can bypass previous stores, but a store cannot bypass previousloads, so there can be no antidependencies between loads and stores. Astore is conventionally issued in program order with respect to otherstores, so there can be no output dependencies between stores.

Conventionally, loads are performed at the data cache in program orderwith respect to other loads. Those skilled in the art have thought thatthere was little or no performance advantage in allowing loads to beperformed out of order, because the data supplied to the processor byolder loads is more likely to be needed in computation than the datasupplied by new loads.

A more detailed description of some of the concepts discussed above isfound in a number of references, including John L. Hennessy et al.,Computer Architecture—A Quantitative Approach (Morgan KaufmannPublishers, Inc., San Mateo, Calif., 1990) and Mike Johnson, SuperscalarMicroprocessor Design (Prentice-Hall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs, N.J.,(specifically chapter 8, parts of which have been reproduced above)1991) which are both incorporated by reference in their entirety.

BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention provides a system for managing load and storeoperations necessary for reading from and writing to memory or I/O in asuperscalar RISC architecture environment. The present inventionprovides a microprocessor system for executing a program stream whichincludes an instruction fetch unit for fetching instructions from aninstruction store and for providing a predetermined plurality of theinstructions to an instruction buffer. It further includes aninstruction execution unit, coupled to the instruction fetch unit, forexecuting the plurality of instructions from the instruction buffer inan out-of-order fashion.

The execution unit includes a load store unit adapted to make loadrequests to a memory system out-of-order and store requests in-order.Thus, the main purpose of the load/store unit of the present inventionis to make load requests out of order whenever feasible to get the loaddata back to the instruction execution unit as quickly as possible. Aload operation can only be performed out of order if there are noaddress collisions and no write pendings. An address collision occurswhen a read is requested at a memory location where an older instructionwill be writing. Write pending refers to the case where an olderinstruction requests a store operation, but the store address has notyet been calculated. The data cache unit returns eight bytes ofunaligned data. The load/store unit aligns the data properly before itis returned to the instruction execution unit (IEU). Thus, the threemain tasks of the load/store unit are: (1) handling out of-order cacherequests; (2) detecting address collision; and (3) alignment of data.

The load store unit includes an address path adapted to manage aplurality of addresses associated with the plurality of instructionsbeing executed and address collision means for detecting and signalingwhether address collisions and write pendings exist between each of theplurality of instructions being executed, wherein the load store unitperforms the load requests if no address collisions and no writependings are detected. The load store unit further comprising a datapath for transferring load and/or store data to and from the memorysystem and the instruction execution unit, the data path configured toalign data returned from the memory system to thereby permit data notfalling on a cache quad-word boundary to be returned from the memorysystem to the instruction execution unit in correct alignment.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS/FIGURES

This invention is pointed out with particularity in the appended claims.The above and further advantages of this invention may be betterunderstood by referring to the following description taken inconjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which:

FIG. 1 illustrates a block diagram of a microprocessor architecture 100in which the present invention operates.

FIG. 2 illustrates a general block diagram of Instruction Execution Unit(IEU) 107, which includes load store unit (LSU) 205.

FIG. 3 illustrates a block diagram of LSU address path 220;

FIG. 4 illustrates a schematic diagram of the address collision blocklocated in LSU 205.

FIG. 5 illustrates a schematic diagram of LSU data path 210.

FIG. 6 shows an example of an unaligned integer load with a cache linecrossing.

FIGS. 7(a) through 7(h) illustrate an example of the operation of LSU205.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

Referring to FIG. 1, there is provided in accordance with a preferredembodiment of the present invention a microprocessor architecturedesignated generally as 100. System architecture 100 includes a hostprocessor 105, a cache control unit and memory (CCU) 110, a VirtualMemory Unit (VMU) 115, an I/O subsystem 190, a memory control andinterface unit (MCU) 120, and interleaved memory banks 160a, 160b, 160c(hereinafter main memory 160) configured for interleaved operations.Main memory 160 is connected to MCU 120 via an external data bus 162. Itis contemplated that the present invention will operate in amultiprocessor environment, and as such, other processors will beconnected to memory bus 162.

Host processor 105 executes software instructions which are stored ataddresses, or locations, in main memory 160. These software instructionsare transferred to host processor 105 sequentially under the control ofa program counter. Oftentimes, some of the instructions require thathost processor 105 access one or more of the peripheral I/O devices 135.

MCU 120 is a circuit whereby data and instructions are transferred (reador written) between CCU 110 (both D-cache 119 and I-cache 118 (readonly)), IOU 150, and main memory 160. MCU 120 includes a switch network145 which has a switch arbitration unit 132, a data cache interfacecircuit 117, an instruction cache interface circuit 112, an I/Ointerface circuit 155, and one or more memory port interface circuits148 known as ports, each port interface circuit 148 includes a portarbitration unit 134.

Switch network 145 is a means of communicating between a master andslave device. The possible master devices to switch network 120 areD_Cache 119, I_Cache 118, or an I/O Controller Unit (IOU) 150 and thepossible slave devices are memory port 148 or IOU 150, for example. Thefunction of switch network 145 is to receive the various instruction anddata requests from CCU 110 (i.e., I_Cache 118 and D_Cache 119) and IOU150. These units may be referred to as bus requesters. After havingreceived these requests, the switch arbitration unit 132 and the portarbitration unit 134 prioritizes the request(s) and passes them to theappropriate memory port (depending on the instruction address). The port148, or ports as the case may be, will then generate the necessarytiming signals, and send or receive the necessary data to and fromexternal memory bus 162. An Instruction Fetch Unit (IFU) 106 and anInstruction Execution Unit (IEU) 107 are the principle operativeelements of host processor 105. VMU 115, CCU 110, and MCU 120 areprovided to directly support the function of IFU 106 and IEU 107. IFU106 is primarily responsible for the fetching of instructions, thebuffering of instructions pending execution by IEU 107, and, generally,the calculation of the next virtual address to be used for the fetchingof next instructions. Simultaneously, instructions are fetched by IFU106 from I_cache 118 via instruction bus 101. The instructions areplaced in “buckets” or sets of four instructions. The transfer ofinstruction sets is coordinated between IFU 106 and CCU 110 by controlsignals provided via a control bus 102. The virtual address of aninstruction set to be fetched is provided by IFU 106 via an IFU controland address bus 103 to VMU 115. Arbitration for access to VMU 115 arisesfrom the fact that both IFU 106 and IEU 107 utilize VMU 115 as a common,shared resource. In the preferred embodiment of architecture 100, thelow order bits defining an address within a physical page of the virtualaddress are transferred directly by IFU 106 to the CCU 110 via controllines 102. The virtualizing high order bits of the virtual addresssupplied by IFU 106 are provided by the address portion of the buses103, 104 to VMU 115 for translation into a corresponding physical pageaddress. For IFU 106, this physical page address is transferred directlyfrom VMU 115 to the CCU 110 via the address control lines 111 one-halfinternal processor cycle after the translation request is placed withVMU 115.

The instruction stream fetched by IFU 106 is, in turn, provided via aninstruction stream bus 108 to IEU 107. Control signals are exchangedbetween IFU 106 and IEU 107 via control lines 109.

IEU 107 stores and retrieves data from D_Cache 215 via a bidirectionaldata bus 112. The entire physical address for IEU 107 data accesses isprovided via an address portion of control bus 113 to CCU 110. IEU 107utilizes VMU 115 as a resource for converting virtual data addressesinto physical data addresses suitable for submission to CCU 115. Unlikeoperation with respect to IFU 106, VMU 115 returns the correspondingphysical address via bus 104 to IEU 107.

CCU 110 is used to serve as a buffer between host processor 105 and mainmemory 160. Generally, CCU 110 is a small, fast memory located close tohost processor 105 that holds the most recently accessed code or data.CCU 110 performs the generally conventional high-level function ofdetermining whether physical address defined requests for data can besatisfied from the instruction and data caches 118, 119 as appropriate.Where the access request can be properly fulfilled by access to theinstruction or data caches 118, 119, CCU 110 coordinates and performsthe data transfer via the data buses 101, 113. Where a data accessrequest cannot be satisfied from the instruction or data cache 118, 119,CCU 110 provides the corresponding physical address to MCU 120 alongwith sufficient control information to identify whether a read or writeaccess of main memory 160 is desired, the source or destination cache118, 119 for each request, and additional identifying information toallow the request operation to be correlated with the ultimate datarequest as issued by IFU 106 or IEU 107.

FIG. 2 shows a representative high level block diagram of IEU 107datapath. Simply put, the goal of IEU 107 is to execute as manyinstructions as possible in the. shortest amount of time. IEU 107contains a register file 250, a load store unit (LSU) 205, aninstruction bus (IBUS) 225, a set of functional units 260, 262, 230, animmediate displacement buffer 255, a segment base generator 257, and awritebus 270. LSU 205 is divided into two parts: a LSU address path 220and a LSU data path 210.

A superscalar control block (not shown) determines when an instructioncan be issued by performing a data dependency check and checking todetermine whether the required functional unit 260, 262, 230 isavailable. Once the superscalar control block decides to issue aninstruction, IBUS 225 retrieves (from register file 250, bypass data280, 282, or immediate data 258, 259) the data required by the issuedinstruction. IBUS 225 is comprised of a plurality of multiplexers thatselect which data will be transferred to functional units 260, 262 and230. IBUS 225 transfers the data to a pair of buses: an A bus and a Bbus. The selected data is placed on either the A bus or the B bus bydetermining which functional unit 260, 262, 230 will be used by theinstruction or is required by the operation of the instruction beingexecuted.

Most instructions' inputs and outputs come from, or are stored in, oneof several register files. In a preferred embodiment, each register file250 (e.g., separate integer, floating point and boolean register files)has thirty-two real entries 254 plus a group of eight temporary buffers252. When an instruction completes (the term “complete” means that theoperation is complete and the operand is ready to be written to itsdestination register) its results are stored in a preassigned locationin temporary buffers 252. The results are later moved to the appropriateplaces in real registers 254. This movement of results from temporarybuffers 252 to real registers 254 is called “retirement.” More than oneinstruction may be retired at a time. Retirement comprises updating the“official state” of the machine including the computer's programcounter.

Instructions are sent to IEU 107 from IFU 106 through an instructiondecode FIFO (first-in-first-out) register stack storage device (notshown) (referred to herein as an instruction window) in groups of fourcalled “buckets.” The bucket is broken up into four units: a load, astore, and two execute units. The bucket has been broken up into thesefour units since system 100 operates with instructions that can performeither a load, a store, an execute, or a combination of all three. Thus,the present invention provides a bucket that can handle all threesituations.

IEU 107 can decode and schedule up to four buckets of instructions atone time. The instruction window stores 16 total instructions in fourbuckets. IEU 107 examines the instruction window; every cycle IEU 107tries to issue a maximum number of instructions from the instructionwindow. Once all the instructions in a bucket are executed and theirresults are stored in the processor's register file 250, the bucket isflushed from the instruction window and a new bucket is stored in theinstruction window.

Once the instruction is issued, the registers in register file 250 canbe accessed. The temporary register 252 is accessed when an instruction,that had a data dependency on data produced from an earlier instruction,is executed. The data from register file 250 is transferred via datalines 254 to IBUS 225.

DAFU 230 calculates a 32-bit linear address for use by LSU 205. DAFU 230supports many different addressing modes. DAFU 230 calculates the firstand last address of the data which takes two cycles if the data crossesa quad-word boundary. Up to four components are added to form theaddress. These components are the segment base, a base register, ascaled index register, and a displacement value. The Segment Basecontains the starting address of the desired memory segment. The baseand index registers are any 32-bit register from the register file 250.The index register is scaled by multiplying it by 1, 2, 4 or 8. Thedisplacement value is a constant value (immediate) given in theinstruction. Any of these fields can be omitted giving maximumflexibility in address calculation.

The segment base comes from the Segment Register block 257. Segment basegenerator 257 produces a value that is indicative of how the data ispartitioned in memory, and transfers this value to DAFU 230 via dateline 266. The displacement comes from an immediate displacement buffer255. Immediate displacement buffer 255 transfers immediate data vialines 265 to DAFU 230 and to IBUS 225 via data lines 258 and 259,respectively. DAFU 230 and VMU 115 provide LSU 205 with the addresses ofany load and/or store requests. LSU 205 processes these requests andeventually returns any requested data to write bus 270. The write bus270 is comprised of a set of multiplexers that select which data (e.g.,data provided by LSU 205 or data provided by functional units 260 or262) to latch into register file 250 based on a priority scheme. Thedata is transferred from write bus 270 to register file 250 via lines275, 276. Data from load and/or stores are always given highestpriority. Occasionally, when two instructions are issued back to back,and they depend on each other, IEU 107 would like to bypass storing thedata into the register file 250 and latch it immediately into IBUS 225.This can be accomplished via data lines 280,281. Consequently, theresources that are waiting for the data need not waste a cycle waitingfor the data to flow through the register file 250.

Data from data lines 275, 276 is also provided directly to LSU data path210 in case an instruction involves an execute operation and a storeoperation. After performing the load and execute operations, the datacan be directly transferred to LSU datapath 210 in order to perform thestore. This eliminates having to access the temporary register file 252for the store data, which in turn increases instruction execution time.The main purpose of LSU 205 is to make load requests to CCU 110 out oforder whenever feasible to get the load data back to IEU 107 as quicklyas possible. A load operation can only be performed out of order ifthere are no address collisions and no write pendings. An addresscollision occurs when a read is requested at a memory location where anolder instruction will be writing. Write pending refers to the casewhere an older instruction requests a store operation, but the storeaddress has not yet been calculated. LSU 205 is divided into two parts:data path 210 and address path 220. The address path 220 interfaces withDAFU 230, VMU 232, and CCU 110 and the datapath interfaces with thewritebus 270, CCU 110, DAFU 230, and IBUS 225. The three main tasks ofLSU are: (1) out of order cache requests; (2) address collisiondetection; and (3) data alignment.

Each bucket of instructions can contain a load and a store to the sameaddress (with'some other operation in between), a load only, a storeonly, or no load and no store. Thus, LSU 205 has a selection of up tofour loads and four stores to choose from. The instruction set used inthe preferred embodiment of the present invention is a CISC instructionset which allows such complex operations as:

-   -   a) R1ηR1+[R2+(R3*2)+3]    -   b) [R2]η[R2] OR R4        where [x] indicates a memory operand located at address x. The        instruction decode unit (not shown) in a preferred embodiment        breaks down these CISC instructions into RISC sequences as        follows:    -   a) LOAD [R2+(R3*2)+3]→Temp Register Execute R1+Temp→R1    -   b) LOAD [R2]→Temp Register Execute Temp OR R4→Temp Register        STORE Temp Register to address [R2]        In both cases, DAFU 230 calculates the address of the memory        operand, but only one address calculation is necessary per        instruction bucket because the load and the store share the same        address. For a description of decoding CISC instructions into        RISC instructions, see U.S. Pat. No. 5,438,668 entitled “System        and Method for Extraction, Alignment and Decoding of CISC        Instructions into a Nano-Instruction Bucket for Execution by a        RISC Computer,” which is hereby incorporated by reference.

FIG. 3 shows a detailed block diagram of the address path 220 of LSU205. Load instructions are issued from the instruction window forexecution out of order by IEU 107, whereas stores are always issued inorder. The address for the load and/or store is calculated as soon asall operands are valid and DAFU 230 is available for addresscalculation. LSU 205 can make a cache request before it has the physicaladdress from DAFU 230. However, if the physical address is not providedfrom DAFU 230 and VMU 115 by the next clock cycle, the cache request iscancelled. If the cache request is cancelled, it must be reissued at alater time.

Only one address is needed for each instruction bucket and serves asboth a load address and a store address. For each instruction bucket,two 32-bit addresses are stored in one of the address buffers 310-313:one for the first byte of the access and one for the last byte of theaccess. When the lower 12-bits are ready from DAFU 130, they are latchedinto a temporary buffer 305. The following cycle, when the upper 20 bitsare ready from the VMU 115, all 32-bits are latched into the appropriateaddress buffer (i.e., Address1 or Address2).

Address calculation is not done in instruction order, but instead isperformed when the register dependencies have cleared. After translationof the address, a valid bit (not shown) is set in the instruction'saddress buffer 310-313 indicating that the address is valid. There aretwo reasons for keeping both addresses: address collision detection andcache request for page crossing.

The address utilized by LSU 205 is a physical address as opposed to thevirtual address utilized by IFU 106. While IFU 106 operates on virtualaddresses, relying on coordination between CCU 110 and VMU 115 toproduce a physical address, IEU 107 requires LSU 205 to operate directlyin a physical address mode. This requirement is necessary to insure dataintegrity in the presence of out-of-order executed instructions that mayinvolve overlapping physical address data load and store operations. Inorder to insure data integrity, LSU 205 buffers data provided by storeinstructions until the store instruction is retired by the IEU 107.Consequently, store data buffered by LSU 205 may be uniquely presentonly in LSU 205. Load instructions referencing the same physical addressas an executed but not retired store instruction(s) are delayed untilthe store instruction(s) is actually retired. At that point the storedata may be transferred to the CCU 110 by LSU 205 and then immediatelyloaded back by the execution of a CCU data load operation.

As discussed above, address calculation by DAFU 230 occurs in one clockcycle and address translation by VMU 132 the next. If the address is fora load, then a cache request is made. If the address is for a store,then LSU 205 waits for the retirement signal to be sent beforeperforming the store. A load request can be made to CCU 110 as early asthe first cycle of the address calculation. The lower 12-bits of theaddress are sent to CCU 110 at this time and the upper 20-bits (whichrepresent the page number) are sent to CCU 110 the following cycle afteraddress translation.

When the load store address path 220 is free, an immediate request canbe made to cache 110 via line 330. Since there are no pending loadand/or store addresses currently in the load store address path 220,there is absolutely no danger of an address collision or a writepending. Thus, the request can be made immediately to cache 110.

Block 340, which includes a plurality ofmultiplexers, is used forselecting the address for the cache request from address buffers310-313.

LSU 205 uses address buffers (i.e., reservation stations) 310-313 formaking requests to cache 110. The four address buffers 310-313 (alsoreferred to as reservation stations) correspond to the four bucketscontained in the central instruction window (not shown). When IEU 107requests the new bucket from the decode unit (not shown), one of theaddress buffers 310-313 is reserved. The address buffer 310-313 isassigned according to instruction number. An historical pointer isupdated to indicate the youngest (or newest) instruction. At this time,it is known whether the instruction involves a load, a store, both, orneither, as is the size of the data involved in the load and/or storeoperation. Address buffers 310-313 are deallocated when thecorresponding instruction is retired by IEU 107. Subsequent todeallocation, a new instruction bucket is received from the decode unit(not shown).

A load dependency (address collision) on a store must be detected inorder to use load bypassing and out-of-order load execution. A loaddependency is indicated by an address collision or a pending storeaddress. A load dependency occurs when a load operation is requested ata memory location where an older instruction requested a storeoperation. The address collision detection requires the first address ofthe load to be compared against two addresses (the first and last) foreach older store. This extra comparison with the last byte of theaddress is required since the store could cross a quad-word pageboundary or be unaligned. Masking of the address bits is done dependingon the size of the data to minimize false dependency detection. If theload data crosses a quad-word (64-bit) boundary, it is assumed in apreferred embodiment to have a load dependency since comparators are notavailable to check the second address of the load against the twoaddresses of each store. When a collision is detected, the loadoperation must wait until after the colliding store operation has beensent to CCU 110. A pending store address means that the address of thestore is not yet valid, so a load dependency must be assumed until thetime the address is known.

FIG. 4 shows a schematic diagram of an address collision detection block400 used by LSU 205. The address comparison logic compares two addressesafter 0-4 of the least significant bits have been masked out. Aftermasking, if the addresses match exactly then there is a collisionbetween them. For each comparison, the largest operand size of the twooperations is used to control the masking. Between 0 and 4 leastsignificant bits are masked out of each address. Note that circuit 400is duplicated four times—once for each address buffer 410-413 (FIG. 4shows the address collision detection block for address buffer 310).

The first address 405, 406 for each load is compared against each otherpair of addresses 407-418. The two compare results are ANDed with theirvalid bits 419-424, and then ORed together to produce an address match430 a, 430 b, 430 c. Address match 430 is then ANDed with theinstruction number compare 425-427 and the store bit 431-433 to producethe collision check 450 a, 450 b, 450 c. The instruction number compare425-427 indicates the relative age between two instructions. Forexample, instruction compare 425 indicates the relative age between afirst instruction in address buffer 310 and a second instruction inaddress buffer 311. If the second instruction is older then the firstinstruction then no collision exists. These three collision checks 450are ORed together to yield an. address collision signal 460 for theparticular load being checked.

When detecting an address collision, the starting (first) address ofeach load is compared with the first and second address of each store.Since a load or store operation may be accessing anywhere from 1 to 10bytes, some masking of the address is done to insure that a collisionwill be detected. This is done via signals 470-475. 0, 2, 3 or 4 of theleast-significant-bits are masked out of both addresses before comparingthem to each other. If the masked addresses match exactly (equalcompare) then an address collision is possible. The number of bits tomask out (0, 2, 3, 4) depends on the operand size of the twoinstructions whose addresses are being compared, along with the twoleast significant bits of the first address. The two least significantbits of the first address must be used in order to limit the number ofcollisions which are detected incorrectly. The largest operand size isused with masking as follows: Operand Size Number of Bits to Mask 1 byte0 bit mask 2 bytes 1 bit mask if address ends in 0 2 bit mask if addressends in 01 3 bit mask if address ends in 11 4 bytes 2 bit mask ifaddress ends in 00 3 bit mask if address ends in 1 or 10 8 bytes 3 bitmask 10 byte 4 bit maskAdditionally, any time the load operation crosses a quad-word boundary,it is assumed to have an address collision. This is because only thefirst address of the load is compared to the store addresses and anaddress collision might not be detected.

By doubling the number of comparators used in hardware, this restrictioncould be removed. If the store address crosses a quad-word boundary thenthe collision would be detected.

The following examples show why masking is required. (All numbers beloware in binary). Address2 of the load is not given since it is not usedfor collision checking.

EXAMPLE 1

Operation address1 address2 size mask LOAD . . . . . 1001 — 2 bytes 2bits STORE . . . . . 1000 . . . . .1011 4 bytes 2 bits

If load address 1001 was compared with 1000 and 1011 without masking, nocollision would be detected even though the store will actually write tobytes 1000, 1001, 1010 and o011. If the two LSB's are masked out thenthe following addresses will result: Operation address1 address2 LOAD .. . . . 1000 — STORE . . . . . 1000 . . . . .1000

EXAMPLE 2

Operation address1 address2 size mask LOAD . . . . . 0100 — 4 bytes 2bits STORE . . . . . 0001 . . . . .1000 8 bytes 3 bits

If three LSB's are masked out then the following addresses will resultand the address collision will be detected: Operation address1 address2LOAD . . . . . 0000 — STORE . . . . . 0000 . . . . .1000

If only two LSB's are masked out then the following addresses willresult and the address collision will not be detected: Operationaddress1 address2 LOAD . . . . . 0100 — STORE . . . . . 0000 . . . ..1000As discussed above, LSU 205 can select from a window of up to four loadinstructions and four store instructions requiring a cache request.These loads and stores contend with each other for CCU 110 and theselection between them is done as outlined below.

The store instruction must be performed in program order with respect toall other instructions, not just other load and stores. A store requestis issued to CCU 110 when a signal comes from IEU 107 to retire thestore instruction. This signal indicates that all previous instructionshave finished and they did not involve an exception or mispredictedbranch. The store instruction cannot be performed any earlier since astore irrevocably changes the state of the machine and it is essentialto verify that an exception or branch did not occur. The store is givenpriority over a load for using data cache 119 since delaying the storewould also delay the retirement of the bucket and the acceptance of thenext decoded bucket from the instruction decode unit (not shown).

Most load instructions can be issued out-of-order provided that the loadis not dependent on a previous store. An exception to this is loads withside effects such as reads from memory-mapped I/O. The preferredembodiment of the present invention uses a memory-mapped input/output(I/O) subsystem. Some I/O devices change state when accessed by a read;for example, some FIFO buffers sequence to the next data item whichresults in some device-status registers clearing themselves. In thistype of system, load bypassing is a dangerous operation. A bypassed loadmay be issued incorrectly, because of a mispredicted branch orexception. The bypassed load cannot be allowed to modify the systemstate incorrectly. The problem is solved by configuring the load storeunit to make these type of requests in order.

The load/store unit also provides a mechanism for notifying cache 110whether or not the data involved in the cache request is cacheable ornot. It also allows the processor to notify cache 110 that this datashould be write-through meaning it is cacheable, but should also writethrough to the memory immediately. External read accesses that changesystem states are a subset of these non-cacheable accesses, but theproblem above is solved by making in-order requests in conjunction withnotifying cache 110 that this data is not cacheable. Thus, rather thanavoiding load bypassing altogether, the processor can prevent thebypassing of noncacheable loads. This permits most load operations totake advantage of bypassing, without causing incorrect operation for theoccasional noncacheable load. This is also necessary to insure that noexceptions occur before the memory is changed. If a load does not have adependency on a store then “load bypassing of stores” will occur.

Each load thus has associated with it two bits: page_cache_disable andpage_write_through. These can come either from VMU 115 or IEU 107.

Store data can come from one of two place. First, it can be issueddirectly to LSU 205 on the integer data buses during 64-bit integerstores. The second way is by snooping the results of the integer andfloating point functional units. This is done to support the common“execute-then-store” sequences where the result of an execution is thestore data for the instruction. This allows the results of CISCinstructions such as “[R2]<[R2] OR R4” to be stored without beingexplicitly issued to LSU 205.

LSU 205 can only make one request to CCU 110 per cycle and priority isgiven to store operations. Store operations are sent to CCU 110 as soonas the write control notifies LSU 205 that this instruction is ready forretirement. Next priority is given to the oldest load operation with avalid address in the address buffers 310-313 which does not have anaddress collision or pending write. Relative age between the instructionis determined by buffer location and the value of the buffer pointer.Finally, priority is given to a new load just arriving from DAFU 230. Inthis last case, address collision and pending write will not be checkeduntil after the request has been made, and if necessary, the loadrequest will be canceled.

Occasionally, a cache miss will occur. For a store, CCU 110 handles thissituation and the miss is completely transparent to LSU 205. For a load,LSU 205 is notified of the cache miss and a delay is observed before thedata is returned. LSU 205 then signals the IEU 107 that the cache missoccurred so that instructions waiting for this data can be canceled.

If the desired data crosses a cache line boundary, two or three cacheaccesses must be made for the load operation. These requests are madeconsecutively, one each cycle. In a preferred embodiment, a cache lineis 8 bytes wide and aligned at address ending with 000. Three cacherequests are only required for 80-bit data accesses beginning at anaddress ending in 111. A load aligner 550 (described below withreference to FIG. 5) is provided to shift and latch this data as itreturns from data cache 119.

Most load/store units zero-extend or sign-extend the data to fit thedestination register. However, the preferred embodiment of the presentinvention preserves the initial value of the destination register andonly changes a portion of it. This, of course, is relevant only forinteger load data with a size of 8 or 16 bits. The initial contents ofthe register are sent to LSU 205 at the time of address calculation. Theload data from data cache 119 is then merged with the initial data.

FIG. 5 shows a schematic diagram of LSU integer data path 210. LSU datapath 210 is responsible for transferring load and/or store data to andfrom CCU 110 and IEU 107. Data enters LSU data path 210 during a loadoperation from data cache 119 via line 290 and during a store operationfrom IEU 107 via lines 275, 276, 277. Data line 275 and 276 provide 32bit data to LSU data path 210 from functional units 260 and 262 viawrite bus 270, line 282 provides either an effective address or mergedata. The effective address is provided to LSU data path 210 when theresult of an instruction is an address itself, as opposed to the datalocated at that address location. Store data line 516 provides 64 bitdata to LSU data path 210. Data is returned to either data cache 119 orIEU 107 via data lines 290 or 292, respectively.

Data buffers 520-526 are provided for holding load and/or store dataduring data transfer to or from data cache 119. There is a one-to-onecorrespondence between each data buffer 520-526 and address buffers310-313 (and in turn with the four instruction buckets). For eachaddress buffer 310-313, there are two corresponding data buffers in LSUdata path 210: one for integer load and integer store data (8 bytes)520-526 and one for floating point load and store data (10 bytes)540-546. The present invention has a separate LSU data path for floatingpoint operations. The operation of floating point data buffers 540-546is the same as those described in connection with the integer data path.Since an instruction is either integer or floating point, the two unitsare do not need to be physically connected. Only the operation ofinteger data buffers 520-526 will be described in detail below.

Control lines 581 and 587 are provided to control the data flow throughmultiplexers 560 and 565, respectively. Control lines 582 through 586are provided to control data flow to/from data buffers 520, 522, 524,and 526.

During a load operation, data enters LSU data path 210 from data cache119 via line 290. The load data enters align block 550 which aligns thedata (as described below) and transfers the aligned load data tomultiplexers 530-536. The aligned load data is then latched into one ofthe data buffer 520-526 depending on which instruction requested thedata. During a store operation, the store data enters LSU data path 210from IEU 107 via data lines 275, 276, 277 and is subsequently latchedinto the appropriated data buffer 520-526.

Once either the load and/or store data has been latched into databuffers 520-526, it can be forwarded to either data cache 119 via line290 or IEU via line 292. All four data buffers 520-526 provide data tomultiplexers 560, 565 which in turn select the appropriate data to betransferred out of LSU data path 210.

Oftentimes, the results of an instruction which includes a store must bestored into main memory 260. Thus, after the instruction executes theresult is directly written via data lines 275, 276 to LSU data path 210(as opposed to first storing the results in register file 250). LSU datapath 210 holds the data in the appropriate data buffer 520-526 until itreceives a retirement signal for the instruction.

Periodically, a particular instruction does not intend to store over anentire destination register. In this case, “merge data” is provided toLSU data path 210 via data line 282. For example, if an instruction onlywants to store 8 bits to the destination register, but the instructionintends to preserve the remaining 24 bits in the register, a mergeoperation is performed. Thus, data line 282 would supply the initialvalue (i.e., merge data) of the destination register to LSU data path210. The merge data (i.e., contents of the destination register) islatched into the appropriate data buffer 520-526. Next, the new (load)data returns from the cache via line 290(a) and enters align block 550.Align block 550 aligns the data and provides it to the multiplexers530-536. The load data is then latched into the same data buffer 520-526which is holding the merge data. Once all the data is assembled it canbe transferred to the proper memory location (i.e., data cache 119 orregister file 250).

Conventional load store units typically require addresses to be alignedto certain boundaries. For example, a 32-bit data access must have anaddress ending in 000. However, the computer architecture of a preferredembodiment allows unaligned accesses of 8, 16, 32, 64, or 80 bit data.Having unaligned addresses has the following effects: (1) extra hardwareis required for detecting load dependencies on stores; (2) the data maycross a page boundary requiring two address translations; and (3)multiple cache accesses may be required for one load.

The load data returned from CCU 110 is 8 bytes long and must be alignedand placed in the proper position in the data buffer 520-526. Sometimestwo or three sets of data must be returned before the complete load isready (e.g., when more than one cache access is required). In addition,these sets of data may even be returned out of order, so specialhandling is required.

Integer data alignment is handled by using eight 8-input multiplexers (8bits wide) with each corresponding to one byte of the data request. An 8bit select line is used to determine which of the 8 bytes of data loadedfrom CCU 110 should be latched into the appropriate data buffer 520-526.Additionally, data buffer 520-526 are byte enabled to control whichbytes can be overwritten.

FIG. 6 depicts an example of an unaligned integer load with a cache linecrossing. In the example, a four byte load was requested from addressXXXXXXX5. However, this load request crosses over a cache line, andconsequently, two load requests are required. After the first cacherequest returns the data, the data is transferred to load aligner 550.Load aligner 550 shifts the last three bytes all the way over to bytezero and then the last three bytes are latched into the appropriate databuffer 520-526. Note that the last byte of the data buffer is not storedover. Once the data from the second cache request returns, the firstbyte of the cache line is latched into the last byte of the data buffer,as shown.

Also note that although the cache line returned in order in thisexample, it can be returned in either order.

Floating point data alignment works the same way as integer dataalignment except that ten 8-input multiplexers are used.

LSU 205 does not support load forwarding. If a load is dependent on astore then that load must wait for the store data to be written to thecache before making the load request. However, there is nothing inherentabout the design of the present invention that would discourageimplementing a load forwarding mechanism. Those skilled in the art wouldreadily be in a position to make the necessary hardware changes toimplement load forwarding.

The preferred embodiment of LSU 205 supports a multi-processingenvironment. Each instruction can contain a lock or an unlock command inaddition to a load and/or a store. These signals are sent to the cachewhich will lock the data and notify the memory and I/O subsystems to dothe same. When lock or unlock commands are present in the instructionwindow, loads must be performed in order with respect to theseinstructions; i.e., a subsequent load can not be performed Without firstperforming the load with the lock/unlock command.

Example of the Operation of LSU 205

Shown in TABLE A is a sample program that illustrates the operation ofLSU 205. The program is written in Intel 486 notation. Three registersare used and they are labeled eax, ebx, and ecx. The data that is loadedand/or stored is assumed to be 32 bits in width. Brackets indicate anaddress location. TABLE A (1) move ebx, [ecx] (2) dec ebx (3) or [eax],ebx (4) (size_16) mov ebx, [eax + 3]The first line of code moves data stored at the address in ecx to ebx;thus this instruction involves a load operation. The second instructiondecreases the value in register ebx; there is neither a load nor a storeassociated with this instruction. The third instruction does a logicalOR with the data stored at the address in eax with the data ebx andstores it in [eax]; this operation involves a load and a store. Finally,the fourth instruction moves 16 bits of data stored at the address ineax plus three to ebx; this instruction involves a load operation.

Before this code is executed, assume that the registers and memorycontain the following values (all value are in hex): TABLE B eax =0000_0010 [0010] = 0000_4321 [0104] = FFFF_FFFF ecx = 0000_1201 [1200] =6500_01FF [1204] = FFFF_FF87

Table C shows the results of executing the instructions shown in TableA. TABLE C mov ebx, [ecx] EBX <-- [ 1201 ] = 8765_0001 dec ebx EBX <--8765_0001 − 1 = 8765_0000 or [eax], ebx [EAX] <-- 0000_4321 or 8765_0000= 8765_4321 (SIZE_16) mov EBX <-- [ 0100 + 3 ] = [0103] = FF87 ->8765_FF8 ebx, [eax + 3]Next, the execution of the instructions in TABLE A will be described indetail.

Referring to FIG. 7(a) through 7(h), a representative illustration ofLSU 205 is shown. Each figure represents a single cycle (e.g., FIG. 7(a)represents cycle 1 and FIG. 7(b) represents cycle 2). All four addressbuffers 310-313 are shown, along with their respective load 701, store702, and valid bits 717. Furthermore, there is a collision bit 710, apending bit 715, as well as an indication of the size 705 of the datarequested. The current memory contents of addresses 0100 to 0107 and1200 to 1207 is shown at reference number 780. Block 730 indicates thecurrent cache request. Block 740 shows the data that has just beenreturned (if any) from CCU 110. Block 760 indicates the address beingreturned from VMU 115 and block 770 indicates the address being returnedfrom DAFU 230. The load and store bits are set in order, while theaddresses can be provided to LSU 205 out-of-order. Block 750 shows howreturned data is physically aligned.

Referring to FIG. 7(a), the first instruction is “mov ebx, [ecx]”.Initially, the address stored in ecx must to transferred to LSU addresspath 220. The address stored in ecx, namely 1201, is transferred fromDAFU 230 to temporary address buffers 305. However, the entire addressis not needed. Only the first twelve bits and the least significantthree bits are transferred to temporary buffers 305 because the upper 20bits are transferred to VMU 115 from DAFU 230. The load bit in bucket 0is set to one since the mov operation involves a load. The requesteddata is 32 bits (as indicated by 011 in block 705).

Since this is the first set of addresses in LSU 205, the addressinformation is immediately forwarded to CCU 110 along with anidentification (id), as shown in block 730. LSU 205 uses theidentification to determine which instruction the returned data isassociated with. The temporary registers 305 are used while LSU 205waits for an address being translated by VMU 115 to be transferred toLSU 205.

The second instruction “dec ebx” has been placed into the address bufferqueue. Since the dec operation involves neither a load nor a store, loadbit 701 and store bit 702 associated with address buffer 311 are bothset to zero. An address calculation is not required for this instructionsince neither a load nor a store is required.

Turning now to FIG. 7(b), the first byte of the address stored in ecxhas now been placed in register address1 and the last byte of theaddress has been placed in address2. Both, of course, in address buffer310. Both valid bits have been set since both registers (address1 andaddress2) contain valid addresses. Note that it is possible for address1and address2 to be latched into the address buffers 310-313 at differenttimes. This happens when there is a page crossing which requires twotranslations from VMU 115.

The third instruction is “or [eax], ebx.” Information (sent by IEU 107)regarding the third instruction has been entered into the appropriateblocks corresponding to address buffer 312. Since the OR instructionrequires a load and a store operation, both bits have been appropriatelyset to one. The data requested is 32 bits long, as indicated in block705. Moreover, the address for the load/store associated with the thirdinstruction is provided by DAFU 230, as shown in block 770. A cacherequest is made for this data, as shown in block 730.

In addition, during cycle two the data requested for the firstinstruction has been retrieved from the cache and stored in the dataregister 520. However, the returned data shown in block 730 is unaligneddata. CCU 120 returned the block of data beginning at address 1200, butthe instruction requested 32 bits of data starting at 1201.Consequently, the returned data must be aligned as shown in block 750.The returned data is shifted over by two bits by setting LD-ALIGN to00000010, and then the first 32 bits of data are selected by BYTE_SEL.

Referring now to FIG. 7(c), the LSU 205 is provided with the nextaddress by DAFU 230, as shown in block 770. The addresses associatedwith the third instruction are latched into address buffer 312. Bothvalid bits 717 are set. Since the first instruction has completed itsoperation (i.e., the data was returned from CCU 110 and forwarded to IEU107) the valid bits have now been reset. (The bucket number has beenreset to 4 only for illustration purposes. In a preferred embodiment, apointer keeps track of the relative age of the instructions.) The thirdinstruction, requires the fetching of the address stored in eax. Oncethe address enters LSU 205 a cache request can be performed.

In addition, information concerning the fourth instruction, namely theinstruction is a load and the data being requested is 16 bits in width(indicated by a 010), has arrived from IEU 107, as shown in theappropriate blocks associated with address buffer 313. However, a store(namely, the third instruction) which is older than the fourthinstruction exists. LSU 205 utilizes a pointer to determine whichaddress buffer contains the oldest instruction information. Since thisstore exists, the write pending bit 715 associated with address buffer313 is set. Consequently, a cache request cannot be generated for thefourth instruction at this time.

CCU 110 returns data to LSU 205 for instruction three, as indicated inblock 740. Since the requested data started at address100 the returneddata does not need to be aligned. Only the first 32 bits are selected byBYTE_SEL, and the data is latched into data buffer 526.

Referring to FIG. 7(d), the addresses associated with instruction fourare latched into address buffer 313 and the corresponding valid bitshave been set. Next, an address collision operation is performed.Address1 from instruction four is compared with address1 and address2 ofinstruction three, which results in a determination that an addresscollision exists. As such, the collision bit 710 associated with addressbuffer 313 is set. Because of the presence of a collision, a cacherequest cannot be generated during cycle 4. However, even though a cacherequest cannot be performed, merge data arrives from IEU 107 forinstruction four, as shown in block. The merge data is the data fromregister ebx.

Merge data is required since instruction four is only a 16 bitoperation. The merge data is latched into data buffer 526.

Referring to FIG. 7(e), write A data (WRA_DATA) arrives from IEU 107.WRA_DATA represents the results of the OR operation from instructionthree. This data is latched into data buffer 524. Also during cycle 5,the next bucket is retired, namely bucket 1, as shown in block 780.Specifically, the retire_next bit is set to one indicating that the nextinstruction can be retired and the retire_num bit is equal to oneindicating that the instruction in bucket one should be retired. Notethat the address collision still exists between instruction three andinstruction four.

Referring to FIG. 7(f), the data in data buffer 524 has been ORed withthe data in ebx to produce the value 87654321. During cycle 6, the thirdinstruction is retired, as shown in block 785. The retirement ofinstruction three allows LSU 205 to reset the collision bit 710associated with the fourth instruction. As shown in block 730, a cacherequest is made to store the value produced by the OR operation atmemory location 00000100 (which is the address stored in register eax).As shown in block 780, the data has been stored to this data location.

Referring to FIG. 7(g), instruction four loads the data in memorylocation 0103 (i.e., the first 16 bits of register eax plus three).Consequently, a cache request is made for the load operation associatedwith instruction four, as shown in block 730.

Referring to FIG. 7(h), the requested (unaligned) load data returns fromthe cache, as shown in block 740. As shown in block 750, the data isthen aligned by shifting the data over three bytes since the requesteddata started at address 0103 and not 0100. Since, only the first 16 bitsare requested only the first two bytes are selected from the aligneddata. The 16 bits are then latched into data buffer 526, which in turngets transferred back to IEU 107 for storage in register ebx.

While the invention has been particularly shown and described withreference to preferred embodiments thereof, it will be understood bythose skilled in the art that various changes in form and details may bemade therein without departing from the spirit and scope of theinvention.

1-22. (canceled)
 23. A microprocessor comprising: an instruction fetchunit for fetching instructions from a memory and for providing apredetermined plurality of said instructions to an instruction buffer;and an execution unit for executing said plurality of said instructionsfrom said instruction buffer out of order, said execution unit includinga load/store unit adapted to make out-of-order load requests to thememory relative to instructions in said instruction buffer and makingstore requests in order relative to instructions in said instructionbuffer, wherein said load/store unit includes a data path fortransferring load and/or store data to and from said memory system andsaid execution unit, said data path configured to handle variable lengthdata as said data to transfer and to properly align said data totransfer according to said variable length and transfer said data whensaid data extend over a word boundary.
 24. A microprocessor comprising:an instruction fetch unit for fetching instructions from a memory andfor providing a predetermined plurality of said instructions to aninstruction buffer; and an execution unit for out-of-order execution ofsaid plurality of said instructions from said instruction buffer, saidexecution unit including a load/store unit adapted to make out-of-orderload requests to the memory relative to instructions in said instructionbuffer and to make in order store requests relative to instructions insaid instruction buffer, wherein said load/store unit includes a datapath for transferring load data from said memory system to saidexecution unit, and at least one word of said load data transferred outof order from said memory system.
 25. The microprocessor according toclaim 24 wherein said data path aligns said load data such that saidload data are properly positioned when they extend over a word boundary.26. A microprocessor comprising: an instruction fetch unit for fetchinginstructions from a memory and for providing a predetermined pluralityof said instructions to an instruction buffer, and an execution unit forexecuting said plurality of said instructions from said instructionbuffer out of order, said execution unit including a load/store unitadapted to make load requests to the memory out of order relative toinstructions in said instruction buffer and make storage requests inorder relative to instructions in said instruction buffer, saidload/store unit includes an address collision detector that detectsaddress collisions among said plurality of said instructions, and saidaddress collision detector detects said address collisions based on onlya first address of load related data and a first address and a lastaddress or data length of data to be stored in a preceding store. 27.The microprocessor according to claim 26 wherein said address collisiondetector assumes an address collision when a store address is invalid.28. A microprocessor comprising: an instruction fetch unit for fetchinginstructions from a memory and for providing a predetermined pluralityof said instructions to an instruction buffer; and an execution unit forout-of-order execution of said plurality of said instructions from saidinstruction buffer, said execution unit including a load/store unitadapted to make load requests to the memory out-of-order relative toinstructions in said instruction buffer and make in order storagerequests relative to instructions in said instruction buffer, and saidload/store unit makes load requests without waiting for store data to bewritten in a cache provided between said load/store unit and said memorysystem even if loading is dependent on the storage.
 29. A microprocessorcomprising: an instruction fetch unit for fetching instructions from amemory and for providing a predetermined plurality of said instructionsto an instruction buffer; and an execution unit for out-of-orderexecution of said plurality of said instructions from said instructionbuffer, said execution unit including a load/store unit adapted to makeout-of-order load requests to the memory relative to instructions insaid instruction buffer and to make in order storage requests relativeto instructions in said instruction buffer, and in said load/store unit,each instruction can include a lock or unlock command in addition to aload or store command.
 30. A microprocessor comprising: an instructionfetch unit for fetching instructions from a memory and for providing apredetermined plurality of said instructions to an instruction buffer;and an execution unit for out-of-order execution of said plurality ofsaid instructions from said instruction buffer, said execution unitincluding a load/store unit adapted to make out-of-order load requeststo the memory relative to instructions in said instruction buffer and tomake in order storage requests relative to instructions in saidinstruction buffer, wherein said load/store unit makes in order loadrequests when data are loaded from a memory region in which a state ischanged by an access to the memory region of said memory.
 31. Amicroprocessor comprising: an instruction fetch unit for fetchinginstructions from a memory and for providing a predetermined pluralityof said instructions to an instruction buffer; and an execution unit forout-of-order execution of said plurality of said instructions from saidinstruction buffer, said execution unit including a load/store unitadapted to make out-of-order load requests to the memory relative toinstructions in said instruction buffer and to make in order storagerequests relative to instructions in said instruction buffer, whereinsaid load/store unit makes in order load requests when data are loadedfrom a region to which an I/O device is assigned within the memory. 32.A microprocessor comprising: an instruction fetch unit for fetchinginstructions from a memory and for providing a predetermined pluralityof said instructions to an instruction buffer; and an execution unit forout-of-order execution of said plurality of said instructions from saidinstruction buffer, said execution unit including a load/store unitadapted to make out-of-order load requests to the memory relative toinstructions in said instruction buffer and to make in order storagerequests relative to instructions in said instruction buffer, and saidload/store unit makes in order load requests and informs a cacheprovided between said load/store unit and said memory of uncacheabilitywhen data are loaded from a memory region in which a state is changed byan access to the memory region of said memory.
 33. A microprocessorcomprising: an instruction fetch unit for fetching instructions from amemory and for providing a predetermined plurality of said instructionsto an instruction buffer; and an execution unit for out-of-orderexecution of said plurality of said instructions from said instructionbuffer, said execution unit including a load/store unit adapted to makeout-of-order load requests to the memory relative to instructions insaid instruction buffer and to make in order storage requests relativeto instructions in said instruction buffer, and said load/store unitmakes in order load requests and informs a cache provided between saidload/store unit and said memory of uncacheability when data are loadedfrom a memory region to which an I/O device is assigned within thememory.
 34. A microprocessor comprising: an instruction fetch unit forfetching instructions from a memory and for providing a predeterminedplurality of said instructions to an instruction buffer; and anexecution unit for out-of-order execution of said plurality of saidinstructions from said instruction buffer, said execution unit includinga load/store unit adapted to make out-of-order load requests to thememory relative to instructions in said instruction buffer and to makein order storage requests relative to instructions in said instructionbuffer, and said load/store unit makes in order load requests andinforms a cache provided between said load/store unit and said memory ofuncacheability when data are loaded from a memory region of said memoryfor which page-caching is unavailable.
 35. A microprocessor comprising:an instruction fetch unit for fetching instructions from a memory andfor providing a predetermined plurality of said instructions to aninstruction buffer; and an execution unit for out-of-order execution ofsaid plurality of said instructions from said instruction buffer, saidexecution unit including a load/store unit adapted to make load requeststo the memory out of order relative to instructions in said instructionbuffer and to make in order storage requests relative to instructions insaid instruction buffer, and said load/store unit allows said memory anda cache provided between said load/store unit and said memory to writethrough when said load/store unit makes a store request in order to saidmemory.
 36. A microprocessor comprising: an instruction fetch unit forfetching instructions from a memory and for providing a predeterminedplurality of said instructions to an instruction buffer, and anexecution unit for out-of-order execution of said plurality of saidinstructions from said instruction buffer, said execution unit includinga load/store unit adapted to make out of order load requests to thememory relative to instructions in said instruction buffer and to makein order storage requests relative to instructions in said instructionbuffer, and said load/store unit executes a lock or unlock command andperforms loads in order when the lock or unlock command is present insaid instruction buffer.
 37. A microprocessor comprising: an instructionfetch unit for fetching instructions from a memory and for providing apredetermined plurality of said instructions to an instruction buffer;and an execution unit for out-of-order execution of said plurality ofsaid instructions from said instruction buffer, said execution unitincluding a load/store unit adapted to make out-of-order load requeststo the memory relative to instructions in said instruction buffer and tomake in order storage requests relative to instructions in saidinstruction buffer, and said load/store unit reads data corresponding toa line from a cache provided between said load/store unit and saidmemory and retrieves aligned data when said instruction from saidinstruction buffer is a load instruction.
 38. A microprocessorcomprising: an instruction fetch unit for fetching instructions from amemory and for providing a predetermined plurality of said instructionsto an instruction buffer, and an execution unit for out-of-orderexecution of said plurality of said instructions from said instructionbuffer, said execution unit including a register file including aplurality of registers and a load/store unit adapted to make loadrequests to said memory according to instructions in said-instructionbuffer and make store requests, and said load/store unit transfers firstdata from said registers and merges second data from said memory withsaid first data.
 39. The microprocessor according to claim 38 whereinsaid second data are transferred from said memory to said load/storeunit via a cache.
 40. A microprocessor comprising: an instruction windowhaving a plurality of instructionpositions, said instruction positionscontaining any one of a load instruction, a store instruction, aload/store instruction or none of these; and a load/store unit having anaddress buffer that retains address information of said loadinstruction, store instruction, or load/store instruction thatcorresponds to said instructionpositions, information positions thatstore first information indicating whether or not content of saidaddress buffer is valid and second information indicating whichinstruction the content of said address buffer is about, said load,store, or load/store instruction or none of these, and an addresscomparator, wherein: in said load/store unit, when an instruction isread in an instruction position of said instruction window, said addressbuffer is assigned to said instruction and said address buffer isreleased when said instruction is retired, when said instruction is aload instruction with a determined address, said load instruction is setin said assigned address buffer, an address of a preceding store orload/store instruction is compared with an address of said loadinstruction, and a read request is made to the memory when comparedaddresses do not match, when said instruction is a store instructionwith a determined address, said store instruction is set in an assignedaddress buffer, stored data are obtained, and a write request is made tosaid memory after all preceding instructions in said instruction windoware retired, when said instruction is a load/store instruction with adetermined common address, said store instruction is set in an assignedaddress buffer, an address of a preceding store or load/storeinstruction compared with the address of said load/store instruction,and a read request is made to said memory system when the comparedaddresses do not match, the read requestf result is processed, storeddata are obtained, and a write request is made to said memory systemafter all preceding instructions in said instruction window are retired.41. A microprocessor comprising: an instruction fetch unit for fetchinginstructions from a memory and for providing a predetermined pluralityof said instructions to an instruction buffer; and an execution unit forout-of-order execution of said plurality of said instructions from saidinstruction buffer, said execution unit including a register fileincluding a plurality of real registers and a plurality of temporaryregisters and a load/store unit adapted to make out of order loadrequests to the memory relative to all instructions in said instructionbuffer and to make in order storage requests relative to allinstructions in said instruction buffer, and said load/store unitincludes: an address collision detector detecting and signaling anaddress collision and a write pending between said plurality of saidinstructions, an address path adapted to control a plurality ofaddresses regarding said plurality of said instructions and to provideaddresses to said memory responsive to said address collisiondetector;and a data path for transferring load or store data to or from saidmemory system and said execution unit.
 42. A microprocessor comprising:an instruction fetch unit that has an instruction buffer for buffering aplurality of instructions fetched from an instruction store; anexecution unit that decodes the plurality of instructions from theinstruction buffer to execute thereof out of order, said execution unitincluding a load/store unit adapted to make load requests to a memoryout-of-order in connection with the plurality of instructions and storerequests in-order in connection with the plurality of instructions, saidload/store unit having, an address path adapted to manage an addressassociated with the plurality of the instructions and to supply anaddress to the memory, an address collision section, coupled to theaddress path, that detects and signals whether address collisions andwrite pendings exist among the plurality of the instructions, whereinthe load/store unit performs the load requests if no address collisionsand no write pendings are detected, a data path for transferring load orstore data to or from the memory and the execution unit, said data pathconfigured to align data returned from the memory to thereby permit datafalling on a word boundary to be returned from the memory to theexecution unit in correct alignment.
 43. The microprocessor according toclaim 42, wherein the address path includes a plurality of addressbuffers for storing a high order and a low order byte of the load or thestore request.
 44. The microprocessor according to claim 42, wherein theload/store unit further includes a section that makes multiple memoryrequests to memory if requested data falls on a word boundary.
 45. Themicroprocessor according to claim 42, further comprising a data addressfunctional unit, connected to the load/store unit, adapted forcalculating addresses for the plurality of instructions.
 46. Themicroprocessor according to claim 45, further comprising a virtualmemory unit adapted to provide physical address translations, which aregenerated from a virtual address, to the execution unit and theload/store unit.
 47. The microprocessor according to claim 46, whereinthe load/store unit must have a physical address from the data addressfunctional unit and the virtual memory unit before it makes a memoryrequest.